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This research paper is
aiming at analyzing the perceptions of undergraduate students about using
comics as a learning strategy in the tourism and hospitality higher education.
This study is using qualitative approach to understand the importance of using
comics in improving the level of innovative thinking and problem solving skills
in elective tourism and hospitality courses. The research was conducted using
Thematic Appreciation Test (TAT) and semi-structured interviews. The results
indicated that using comics as a teaching strategy can help in bridging the gap
between theory and practice. Moreover, it can be considered as a motivator for
innovation in the tourism and hospitality education.
Keywords: Tourism, Hospitality, Innovative Thinking, Learning
Strategy, Comics, Higher Education, Thematic Appreciation Test.
In
this study, comics as an active learning strategy will be investigated in the
context of tourism and hospitality higher education with reference to
undergraduate students. There are several studies highlighted the importance of
using comics strategy for students in higher education (Fabian & MacLean,
2014; Goldenberg et al., 2010). However, there are few studies investigated
comics in tourism and hospitality education (Goldenberg et al., 2010; Silva,
Santos & Bispo, 2017). Therefore, this study is going to be the first
in-depth analysis using the comics as a teaching strategy in tourism and
hospitality education in Egypt. This
study is contributing to the development and improvement of educational
practices as well as enabling significant impacts on the learning process in
tourism and hospitality higher education. This research is aiming at bridging
the gap between theory and practice in tourism and hospitality education.
Tourism
and hospitality higher education started in Egypt in 1962. At that time, two
institutions were formed in Cairo, and then in 1975 they were joined to form on
college under the name of Faculty of Tourism and Hotel Management, Helwan
University (Hewedi, Doma & Al-Hamamsy, 1998). Over the last five decades,
more tourism and hospitality faculties and colleges have been established at
public and private Egyptian universities and currently there are more than 50
public and private higher colleges of tourism and hospitality in Egypt (Afifi,
2011). Despite the large number of undergraduate courses in tourism and
hospitality throughout the country and its growing expansion, there are several
challenges such as the gap between real market demands and academic training
(Abou-Shouk, Abdelhakim & Hewedi, 2014). To overcome this gab, innovative and
active learning strategies should be implemented to foster reflexivity of
tourism and hospitality students and the ability of bridging the gap between
theory and practice (Fatima, Ghandforoush, Khan & Mascio, 2019). Therefore,
this paper aims to investigate comics as an innovative strategy for tourism and
hospitality higher education to achieve the competitiveness in learning. To
achieve this aim, the following research questions were developed:
• What is the
structure of creating comics in tourism and hospitality undergraduate courses?
• How comics
will contribute to the tourism and hospitality undergraduate courses?
Active Learning and Comics
Higher education should allow students to be active in
the learning process, giving them the opportunity to participate, reflect and
have the critical thinking (Boud, Cohen & Sampson, 2014; López-Bonilla
& López-Bonilla, 2014). In addition, Schillemans, Van Twist &
Vanhommerig (2013) highlighted the need for innovative and interactive learning
methods that go beyond the limits of a traditional education to reflective and
transformative learning.
The
development of learning strategies that is appropriate to the characteristics
of the students is essential for the quality of the teaching-learning process
(Wang, Shannon & Ross, 2013). In the context of higher education, the use
of different innovative strategies helps to consolidate meaningful learning practices
and optimization of professional education (Boctor, 2013). In addition,
Bergmann & Sams (2012) declared that building curriculum content should be
depending on students' needs as they are the targets for the learning process.
Thus, the lecturer should be creative and be concerned not only with “what” to
learn to the student, but “why” and “how” (Halili & Zainuddin, 2015).
Many
educational researchers (Dredge et al., 2013; Gross et al., 2017; Yan &
Cheung, 2012) have found that traditional teaching has little effectiveness in
achieving a change in concept of tourism and hospitality. One of the active
learning processes that are gaining ground at different levels of education is
comic strategy which is defined as the combination of class work and online work
under the guidance of the teacher, becoming an experience of integrated
responsibility learning and shared proactive commitment (Green, 2013). In
addition, the comics’ strategy evolves from a lecturer-centered approach to
student-centered approach (Herbst et al., 2011).
According
to Anderman, Andrzejewski & Allen (2011) knowing the profile of the student
is the first step for the effective higher education and the next step is to
identify the appropriate style of learning and teaching strategies. Silva et
al. (2017) proposed a learning system with five relevant dimensions: learning
styles, students and lectures experience, reflective practice, learning
environment and active teaching strategies. The use of more active teaching
strategies can be incorporated into the tourism and hospitality education
process to reduce the gap between theory and practice and to enable the
students to better solve the future problems in the real practice (Ovsenik,
2013). The application of active learning strategies requires the training of
lectures and students, who should be participated in active learning process
(McCabe & O'Connor, 2014). According to Silva et al. (2017), active
learning strategies such as comics should focus on the student to enhance the
creativity and innovation in the teaching.
Marianthi,
Boulodakis & Retalis (2016) pointed out that comic are considered as a
figurative expression, which is accompanied by the presence of images where an
adequate interpenetration between the presence of words and drawings
distinguishing continuity between the story, time and finally highlights the
presence of the balloon that contains the text but in turn delimits the
protagonist. Di Raddo (2006) highlighted that comics are considered as a
narrative mechanism where the structure is not only part of the system; rather
it is made up by the language and image. While Vassilikopoulou et al. (2011)
indicated that comic is considered as a structure of narrative character
conformed by a set of character sequence progressive on the characters in order
to integrate with the respective elements that make up phonetic writing.
Comics
as a teaching strategy can be found in primary, secondary and higher education
(Anderman et al., 2011; Green, 2013; Herbst et al., 2011). On the other hand,
this strategy is not yet popular in tourism and hospitality higher education
and some lectures are unaware of its use as a teaching strategy and do not
recognize its relevance to achieving the interned learning outcomes (Silva et
al., 2017).
When
addressing the use of comics as a teaching strategy in higher education, it
must consider the need to merge theory with reality. A comic must incorporate
all characteristics of scientific objectivity, reliability and facts
(Vassilikopoulou et al., 2011). The formation of comics in tourism and
hospitality education can be through expressing the reality of work in a
sequence of images and narratives (Silva et al., 2017). Wurdinger & Carlson
(2010) indicated that comics support students to feel comfortable to share
their ideas and participate in the learning process. Therefore, the use of
comics in tourism and hospitality education involves presenting a variety of
specific comics within a given context.
Silva
et al. (2017) developed a structure using comics as an innovative strategy in
higher education. It proposes five stages which should be implemented in
lecture. Those five stages are consisting of the following stages: recognition,
planning, action, observation and reflection.
Recognition
is the presentation of the comics’ strategy to students in the lecture. This
stage involves establishing a connection between any issues related to the
topic addressed in the lecture and encourage students to reflect on that topic
and transform reality to comics.
Planning is the guidance process from the lecturer to
the students on creating comics. At this stage, the individual reflection from
students is going to be presented through establishing a sequence of simple
actions for the comic. After individual reflection, which can last 30 min, the
lecturer will form random groups from students, to initiate collective
reflection and discuss their proposals and explain their comics. The guidance
of the lecture should include the following steps:
1) Compose
sequences (beginning, middle and end). Thus they may include pictures or
bullets of different shapes and sizes;
2) Identify the
characters and identify the action for each one.
3) Identify
bubbles which may differ according to the target topic. Dialogues between
characters will be created.
Action
is the drawing stage. Comics will be drawn using any free on-line websites.
Moreover, each group should prepare a description of the comic and reflect on
all the moments during its creation.
The
fourth and fifth stages are reflection and observation. These steps involve the
presentation of the comic by groups in lecture. During the presentation, each
group illustrates which aspects linked to the basic theory of the topic based
on the creation of the comic.
To
conclude, all of the previous steps proposed by Silva et al., (2017) can help
students to think critically and to establish relationships between theory and
practice. This innovative strategy encourages exchange of experiences, making
decisions and allowing students represent a professional situation based on
theoretical precepts. Finally, it contributes to the development of reflective
practice in the field of tourism and hospitality.
In
addition, this study is relying on the flipped classroom approach in order to
enhance the students learning through comics (Mei, 2017). The flipped classroom
or flipped learning model aims to reverse the roles of traditional teaching. At
the beginning, the lecturer design attractive learning materials for students
such as videos, Prezi presentations, etc. and the students are responsible to
explore those materials to obtain basic knowledge before going to class. After
that, receiving and answering questions and comments from students. Finally,
the students should be capable of expanding their knowledge through practical
experiences through using comics’ strategy (Huang & Hong, 2016).
This research paper is using qualitative approach to
understand the students’ experiences of developing comics in tourism and
hospitality undergraduate courses. Inductive approach is going to be used to
make semi-structured interviews and thematic appreciation test in order to be
able to validate the results (Schreier, 2012; Shneidman, 2013; Westwood, 2007).
The
population of this study is students from faculty of tourism and hotel
management, Helwan University, Egypt. The targeted sample was students who are
studying in the following courses: airline companies (practical), introduction
to tourism industry, problems in hotels industry, hotel management. To examine
the impact of using comics in tourism and hospitality higher education, primary
data was collected through semi structured interviews with 20 students. 10 of
them are from tourism studies department and the other 10 students are from
hotel management department. Non-probability sampling technique is used for
data collection as this research is concentrating on specific students who are
studying specific courses and therefore reducing randomness is important
(Schreier, 2012; Tansey, 2007). From ethical point of view, all participated
students of this research are informed about the purpose of this study
(Lichtman, 2012).
The
semi-structured interviews were applied by informing the students about the
process of creating a comic and an investigation was developed. The theoretical
model (Figure 1) will be used as a guide to perform this interview. Thoughts,
attitudes and experiences of the students were collected through
semi-structured interview. This interview is consisting of questions about the
steps of the theoretical model: review, design, flipped course approach and
engaging students in active learning. In addition, questions about creating
comics, learning with comics, difficulties of learning with comics, link
theories with practice by using comics, creative thinking and contribution of
comics’ strategy in their academic learning in the tourism and hospitality
courses were asked.
The
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) which is developed by Murray (1943) is
considered one of the most projective technique of measuring experiences,
thoughts and personality in education (Catterall & Ibbotson, 2000).
Moreover, previous studies indicate that projective techniques such as TAT are
reliable in marketing and management research as well (Soley, 2010). However,
some studies highlight that TAT might be linked to low factor loadings, and
inconsistent findings (Bornstein, 2007). To overcome those defects, this
research is going to implement semi-structured interviews in addition to TAT to
validate the results and make it more reliable (Westwood, 2007). In this
research, the TAT consists of a set of 20 comics (10 comics developed by
tourism students and 10 comics developed by hospitality students) in which each
one showing different situation related to the topic discussed in the lecture.
Two lectures for each group of at least 2 h duration each were used to
implement this technique. The atmosphere of the TAT was favorable for the
students to be able to reveal their creativity. Students are asked to create
stories based on these comics, and these stories would be assessed by the
researchers to understand the effectiveness of those comics. Four questions
were asked to student in parallel with the TAT:
1) What has
fostered the comic to show?
2) What is the
comic talking about at the moment?
3) What are the
characters in the comic think about?
4) What is the
outcome of the comic?
In
this research, analyzing qualitative data should be developed through specific
stages according to Saunders & Lewis (2012). Those stages comprise four
main actions: categorization, unitizing data, recognizing relationships and
developing categories and developing and testing theories to reach conclusions.
In terms of categorization, this research classified the collected responses
from the students into categories. Those categories have been concluded from
the theoretical model. In terms of utilizing data, this research assigned
relevant pieces of information of the collected data to the appropriate
category of the model.
Hence,
Ethical considerations‟ were implemented through coding all students’ names.
The coding process was done to respect the confidentiality of the students’
answers. The coding names depend on the initials of Tourism Students (TS) and
Hospitality Students (HS). For example, (TS1, TS22, HS1, HS2, etc...). Manual
qualitative data analysis was more useful as the researchers were more involved
in it and got closer to the data, becoming used to the students words and using
the analysis to build ideas and themes. In terms of recognizing relationships
and developing categories, the researcher used a simple matrix to sort the data
and make it easy to understand. In this matrix, collected data was placed
within the cells of the matrix. This activity enabled the researcher to
identify key aspects regarding the use of comics as active learning strategy in
tourism and hospitality higher education. With regards to developing and
testing theories to reach conclusions, this research used the analyzed data to
develop a final version of the comics as innovative and active learning
strategy model.
FINDINGS
Analysis of the Semi-Structured Interview
In
this section, analyses of the semi-structured interviews conducted with
students will be presented. The stages illustrated in Figure 1 investigated
through exploring the students’ experiences and opinions about using comics as
an innovative strategy. Moreover, explanation of each stage and its reflection
on undergraduate tourism and hospitality students will be explained.
Review
The
interview initiated with the presentation of the comics strategy to the
students. Most of the interviewed students indicated that their individual
experiences might affect the developing of this strategy in the learning
process. They highlighted the importance of developing student profiles.
It
depends on the personality and experiences of each one of us. Some students might
not have the level of creativity to engage in comics’ strategy. Other students
might see this process as waste of time (HS7).
Yes,
in my opinion, I think they should understand our backgrounds with regards to:
the level of technology used by students, the age, boys or girls, the society
culture (TS9).
In
general, the results highlighted that professional experiences of lecturers
have an impact on the development of comics’ strategy in the classroom (TS2).
Some
of my lecturers are not funny. They are very strict and practical. So, I think
they will not be able to develop this strategy in their classes (HS7).
The
interviewed students highlighted the importance of developing their skills, the
lecturer skills in order to be able to use this strategy. They indicated that
motivating them to engage in this strategy is important as well.
I
think you need to encourage me to participate in developing comics. I don’t
know how to use it. I need training. I think some of our lecturers are not able
to use this strategy. They need someone to train them (TS9).
Design
In
this stage, the researchers asked the interviewees some questions about their
opinion about the factors affecting this stage. All of the interviewed students
for tourism and hospitality departments indicated that setting clear rubrics
and specified time are the major factors affecting this stage.
How
can I develop a comic without understanding what I should do? Tell me exactly
what the required points to develop this comic are and I will do it (TS10).
This
strategy is taking long time from me. You need to tell me exactly how long this
strategy is going to take from my time (HS1).
Flipped
This
stage depends on recording videos, using presentations or interactive resources
and sending them to the students. They should study them at home before the
class. The work in the classroom is consisting of carrying out comics to put
the knowledge into practice. Most of the interviewed students indicated that
those three strategies are useful in explaining the lecture to them and giving
them the opportunity to innovate in the class.
Flipped
classroom gives us the opportunity to perform other types of activities such as
comics (HS10).
It
enhances the collaboration environment and encourages student collaboration and
therefore reinforces our motivation (TS1).
Using
Prezi and videos helped us to acquire knowledge in our peace of time and be
able to study the information in a different way (HS5).
Active
In
the active stage, the participated students were asked about the important
factors affecting them to engage in comics’ strategy. Most of the respondents
declared that it is not only important to be active but also to be constructive
and interactive.
To
be active for me means to refresh and activate my existing knowledge through
developing comics (HS2).
I
can practice this strategy but I think we need to critically explain our comics
to order to have the ability of understanding the topic (TS4).
With
regards to comics, I usually add new information to the comic to enrich it and
innovate. I try to do my best to make my lecturer and colleagues like it (HS6).
I
think comics helped me to interact with my colleagues as I can comment on their
comics (TS8).
When
asked the students about the process of creating the comic, the students
highlighted the importance of planning stage in the theoretical model (Figure
1). TS5 stated that:
There was a discussion among us as a group about
the topic to be addressed and the names of the characters. Then the subject was
debated, deepened and developed by all the members. Once the script was
established, the pictures were organized and presented in class. There was a discussion among us as a group about
the topic to be addressed and the names of the characters. Then the subject was
debated, deepened and developed by all the members. Once the script was
established, the pictures were organized and presented in class.
When analyzing the comics of the participants, it was
observed that the comics’ strategy goes more beyond the theoretical learning,
since it promotes the reflective practice, the exchange of knowledge and can
make students understand better links between theory and practice. Therefore,
it is important to add a constructive stage to let the students explain the
comics to their colleagues and to reflect the feedback of their colleagues into
their comics. With regards to the constructive learning process, all
participants’ emphasized the relevance of exchange knowledge among members of
the group for learning the content of the lecture, as indicated by ST7: Each
one was creating his idea and complementing the knowledge of the other. While
HS1 highlighted that:
Each one in my class suggested an idea and we put them
together and revised our comic.
Most
of the participated students highlighted the importance of adding interactive
step which is not only involving practicing and producing comics but also
increasing their ability to solve problems and innovative thinking through
sharing ideas with their colleagues.
This
teaching strategy gives the opportunity to strength our ability to work in
groups, listen to the opinions of our colleagues and achieve a result. As well
as it helps us to understand the exact meaning for each type of tourists (ST8).
Yes,
comics improved my ability to solve problems. In lectures, we used to find a
solution for a specific situation through developing comics (HS3).
These
activities help us to show our creativity, our learning and better solve the
problems managers in hospitality industry dealt with in class (HS1).
Analysis of Thematic Appreciation Test
Many
researchers used Thematic Appreciation Test (TAT) in the investigation of
personal assessment about specific phenomena (Catterall & Ibbotson, 2000).
TAT is producing information around the investigated topic. In this research,
this technique is used in the form of stories through comics. The analysis of
this approach is depending of the narrative method in which the respondents are
giving the opportunity to comment and discuss those comics with the
researchers. In addition, the interpretation of respondents’ narrations will
enrich the research results. This technique is related to the qualitative
approach. Therefore, the researchers’ interpretations of respondents’ perceptions
and experience were to develop the final model of this research.
The
purpose of this section is to study the drives, emotions and feelings of
respondents towards using comics’ strategy in tourism and hospitality higher
educations. The technique is composed of a number of 20 comics (10 comics
related to tourism subjects and 10 comics related to hospitality subjects)
representing different situations and scenarios. Participated students are
asked to create those comics and tell stories about those comics and the method
that they follow in order to develop them. The researchers used the proposed
five stages developed by Silva et al. (2017) to apply the TAT. Those five
stages are consisting of the following stages: Recognition, planning, action,
observation and reflection.
Recognition
Participated
students received guidance to start creating comics related to the explained
topics. They were introduced by the researchers to Pixton website which will be
used as a main tool to create the comics. They tried to make an outline of the
comic from their individual reflections based on the flipped classroom
approach. The students were stimulated to create comics depending on their
creativity. An important note here is not to give the students any help on
creating the comics structure. However, they followed the specified steps
(Figure 1). This step last for 20 min.
Planning
The
researchers motivated the participated students to create comics. With regards
to the tourism studies department students, the topic explained by the lecturer
was about types of tourists and the impact of tourism on the society. On the
other hand, the topic explained to the hospitality students was types of hotels
and the impact of hotel industry on the society. They established the sequence
of the comic itself using different shapes and size and they used dialogue
bubbles. The researchers explained to the students how to use Pixton website in
order to create heir comics. Moreover, they started to form small groups to
discuss the formation of the comic and to reflect on the assigned tourism and
hospitality topics. This stage last for 30 min.
Action
After
outlining the structure of the comic, students encouraged to use online website
to draw their comics in a professional way using (Pixton.com). During the
creation of the comic, students can choose shapes, characters and dialogue
bubbles, using all their imagination and creativity. This step last for 30 min.
Each group should prepare a story of the comic and reflect on all the moments
during its creation.
Reflection and
Observation
The
comics were presented and discussed in the lecture based on the theoretical
considerations. This step takes another 40 min. The comic creation activity was
presented by two groups (each group is consisting of five students).
A Reflection from Students comics in tourism studies department: The participated students from tourism studies department elaborate on types of tourists as discussed in the lecture based on the flipped classroom approach. Figure 2 illustrates one of the comics produced by the students to explain types of tourists. The students explained this comic to their colleagues and they indicated that created this comic through incorporating their partners’ contributions. They tried to solve a problem for one of the tourists who are confused and he is not decided about the right type of tourist which represents him. This comic is representing the innovative thinking of students as they suggested other tourists’ types neither explained to them nor showed to them by flipped classroom approach.
A Reflection from Students comics in hotel management department: The participated students from hospitality department designed comics related to the types of hotels as discussed in the lecture based on the flipped classroom approach. Figure 3 illustrates one of the comics produced by the students to explain types of hotels. The students explained this comic to their colleagues and they indicated that created this comic through incorporating their partners’ contributions. They tried to solve a problem for one of the tourists who are confused and he is not decided about the right type of hotel which represents him. This comic is representing the innovative thinking of students as they suggested the right type of hotel for this tourist depending on the characteristics and features he needs.
To conclude the findings of thematic appreciation test
and the analysis of the stories in the comics presented by the students reveal
that through a sequence of scenes in the comics, the student can illustrate
what they learned about the explained theory in the class and flipped
classroom. They confirmed that the use of comics in the courses of tourism and
hospitality can contribute to the spread the knowledge and bridging the gap
between theory and practice.
The
analysis of TAT indicated that working in groups explores difficult and complex
issues which can have a result of extracting the creative thinking and
experiences of the individuals in the group. The students emphasize that group
learning supports the creation of innovative thinking. TS 13 highlighted that:
"As we have studied the theory before creating the comic, we were
exchanging information and we had no difficulty in understanding the content”.
On the other hand HS3 revealed that, “the content was more understandable about
the impact of hotels on society as the comics helped us to see the causes that
have positive or negative impacts on the society allowing us to understand the
determining factors that my group chose and those chosen by the other
groups". These reflections indicate the potential of the strategy to
enable more significant learning for the students in tourism and hospitality
education.
Most
of the students’ perceptions about the TAT confirmed that there are many
positive characteristics for using comics as a learning strategy. One group of
students mentioned that comics help them to understand the explanation of each
type of tourists. ST8 indicated that “it is possible to remember types of
tourist easily just when I remember the comics created by us and by
others”.
The
comics of the students confirm that the use of innovative teaching strategies
such as the comics can help them to better understand the relationship between
theory and practice. One student said: I felt very comfortable with the topic
of hotel types after the comic (HS10).
The
use of comics helped in moving from concentrating on teaching strategy to focus
on learning strategy. On the other hand, some of the students agree that there
is a limitation for this strategy as each group is concentrating on part of the
theoretical content studied in lecture.
I
would not say it was a difficult strategy. The topic was explained by the
lecture. Each group was focused to elaborate on the topic that they choose. We
created a comic on what we choose. However, nothing that would prevent us from
learning about other topics, as they were addressed by the other groups. (ST7)
DISCUSSION
This
study revealed that the comic strategy is an active learning strategy to
increase innovation and problem solving skills for tourism and hospitality
students. Students from both departments’ tourism and hospitality also engaged
quickly in the process of developing comics. Thus, motivating students to think
about relationships between course contents and innovative ideas to produce
comics increased their perceptions about the real practice. The researchers
highlighted that giving the opportunity for students to develop their own
comics has a great impact on their reflective learning. For instance, undergraduate tourism and
hospitality students used what they learned about types of tourists and hotels
to develop their comics (Figures 1 and 2). Those comics explain different
situations where the students tried to think creatively to identify and compare
the different types of tourists and hotels.
According to the findings, this research suggests the following model (Figure 4) based on the students answers from the semi-structured interview and their perceptions about the thematic appreciation test. The suggested model is consisting of eight stages namely: review, prepare, design, flipped, active, constructive, interactive and assessment.
The
design of a comic strategy requires the review of student profiles, lecturer
experiences and student experiences. The results of this research lead to the
identification of context factors that are relevant to student profiles. This
information is going to be useful for decision making in designing comics’
strategy. Students’ profiles should be reviewed in accordance to their
performance indicators, skills, attitudes, behaviors, their level in using
technology and their age. The student experiences should be incorporated as an
objective in the reviewing process of a comic strategy. The results indicated
that students’ experiences from academic studies to social interactions have a
great impact on the development of comic strategy. Those experiences include
teamwork, leadership, written communication and interpersonal relationships.
Good lecturers allow systematizing from their experiences. The results
indicated that lecturers’ experiences are relevant in the process of comics’
development. For example, lecturer’s attempt to overcome the gap between theory
and practice, digital literacy experience, problem solving and time management.
To summarize, the lecturer has to review the integration of these three
components: student profiles, lecturer experiences and student experiences.
The findings indicated that there
is a preparation stage should be added after review stage. This stage should
include training of lecturers and students on using this strategy In addition,
motivating students to participate in this strategy is important to achieve the
intended learning outcomes.
The third stage suggested by this
research is called design. Lecturer should design comics to create activities
in an easy and effective way. Therefore, guiding students learning towards
developing comics is vital. Lecturer should develop an activity in which
explaining the goals of the comics through setting a specific rubrics for the
students. Those rubrics should include:
• How to generate an idea?
• Identifying the central theme and the
conclusion of the story
• Distributing the content in specific
paragraphs
• How many characters will the story have?
• The visual elements needed to contextualize
the comic story
• Is the content of my comic understood by
others?
Flipped classroom is the fourth
stage in the suggested model. In this stage, the lecturer should use the
flipped classroom approach in order to motivate the students’ innovative
thinking (Mei, 2017). This approach can be achieved through presentation,
videos or interactive resources. This is will facilitate the process of
developing comics.
Active Learning process can be
started at this point. This stage focuses on the student by promoting their
participation and continuous reflection through activities that activating
existing knowledge. In addition, engage to practice with emphasis on the
development of student skills from simple to complex levels through developing
comics.
The constructive perspective of
learning is the sixth stage in the suggested model. In this stage, the
students’ role is to produce, explain and integrate new information with
existing knowledge in their comics. In fact, tourism and hospitality students
used a variety of problem solving strategies, many of them not taught at
lecture but built by themselves.
Interactive is the seventh stage
in the suggested model. After producing and explaining comics, the students
should add a value to their comics through revising them again and trying to
creating values from incorporating partners’ contributions. This stage will
help to motivate the innovative think and problem solving skills of the
students. Therefore, the students can have a better understanding for the
concepts and reflect the practice in it. The application of this stage will
support the students need to bridge the gap between theory and practice.
Assessment is the last stage in
the suggested model. Lecturers should ask the students what they consider to be
the advantages of implementing this type of strategy to their class, this will
allow to evaluate the perception of the students in relation to the comics and
if, as you considered it, it is a motivation to participate in the activities
of class. Lecturers should measure achieving the intended learning outcomes of
the course. In addition, they should compare the results of student quizzes and
tests before and after applying comics’ strategy.
CONCLUSION
This
article contributes to the knowledge through developing the model of using
comics as innovative strategy for tourism and hospitality students. This model
can help lecturers to form a real experience to the students. The results
indicated that comics can reduce the gap between theory and practice through
contributing to the development of reflective practice in the learning
environment. In addition, innovative thinking and problem solving skills can be
enhanced through applying this model in the classroom. The study reveals that
the use of comics’ strategy in tourism and hospitality courses can help
stimulate creativity, innovation and reflection of students on the practice of
the industry.
This research has many practical
implications. For example, lecturers can adapt the proposed model of using
comics as active learning strategy to develop the innovation thinking and
problem solving skills of their students. Future research could investigate the
proposed model into other educational contexts. In addition, other researchers
could apply the quantitative approach to test the proposed model on large
sample. This research was limited to a limited number of tourism and
hospitality students, who were all taking the same course at the same college
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